Everything was supposed to be okay. Dean had endured the breakup of the Avengers, imprisonment on The Raft, and evasion of the authorities. He survived enslavement on Sakaar, facing off against the goddess of death, and the destruction of Asgard. An...
Jack Allen reached for the ringing telephone, his focus shifting away from his book. "Hello?" he asked after looking at the caller ID, seeing that it was his son, Nolan, calling.
"Grandpa!" his grandson, Jacob cried out fearfully before quickly going into a rapid-fire panic.
"Hold on, Jacob," Jack said. "Slow down and start from the beginning. You said your mom and dad disappeared?"
Rosie walked into the room, alarmed by what she was hearing and stared quizzically at her husband. Before she could interject, her body began to shift into a cloud of dust. Jack stopped talking as Jacob went on to explain that his parents were there one minute and then gone the next. Jack reached out for his wife and his hand penetrated the cloud of dust.
"Oh, God," Jack gasped.
"Grandpa!?"
Jack composed himself, just barely. "Jacob, you stay put. I'm coming to pick you up. Just stay where you are."
Jack hung up the phone and raced toward the front door just as it was opening. His youngest daughter, Grace, stood before him with a look of absolute terror on her face. "Dad," she gasped as she fell into his arms. "I was nearly in a wreck on the way here. Someone ran off of the road but when I went to try and help, they were gone. Like they..."
"Disappeared," Jack quickly cut in.
"Dad?"
"Your mother," Jack said in a voice that bordered on hysteria. "She disappeared. And Nolan and Emma. I was just going to get Jacob."
Grace took her father's arm and led him to her car. As they drove to Jacob, Jack began calling all of his children. One by one, he tried to reach them but no one answered. He turned on the radio and the car was suddenly filled with news that people all over the globe were mysteriously vanishing altogether.
Grace spared a glance at her father as they drove slowly through the city streets, dodging cars that were left running, their passengers gone. At one point they could get no further due to a massive pileup. They got out of the car and took off on foot. As they passed a sedan, the sound of a baby crying alerted them. Grace peaked inside the car to find that the baby was the only occupant in the car. Removing his jacket, Jack wrapped it around his fist and drove it into the window so that he could retrieve the screaming child, even as first response workers rushed toward them to provide aid.
When they finally reached Jacob, he ran out of the house and jumped frantically into Jack's arms. "They're all gone!" he sobbed.
Jack held the boy close and looked at Grace, who was also openly crying.
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Daredevil grabbed the criminal by the collar and slammed him onto the ground, glaring menacingly into his frightened eyes. "I know you've been doing the Kingpin's dirty business," he spoke angrily. "Now, talk!"
